


The Place I Call Home

by Nihonkikuasa211



Category: Code Black (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Future Fic, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-06
Updated: 2016-05-06
Packaged: 2018-06-06 16:23:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6761356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nihonkikuasa211/pseuds/Nihonkikuasa211
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neal thinks of how a definition of a single word has changed throughout the years of his life as Christa lies beside him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Place I Call Home

                                                                                       _The Place I Call Home_

 

“Christa?”

Neal could never forget the expression of pure joy when he saw Christa turn to him. Her blue eyes observed him for a couple of heartbeats, as if she too couldn’t truly believe that she was beside her.

They were lying in bed. Her long blond hair was now short, now only to her chin, but that change did not make her love her any less. Her face now pressed against the frame of his back, and she inhaled.

A memory framed in his mind.

_Christa leaned her hand forward to touch Neal’s face. Her thin hands touched the smoothness of his cheek almost tenderly, almost afraid. Christa’s blue eyes bored into his dark brown, staring at him in wonder._

_“I just wanted to make certain this wasn’t a dream,” she whispered, her voice crackling slightly._

_Neal observed the joy and the pain in her gaze, and felt her smooth skin against his own as he held her. She held onto him, and Neal stroked her hair._

_Telling her, or himself, that it was not a dream._

Months had passed since both of them had reunited with each other. It was still like this. In early morning or late nights, when coming home, both of them would look at each other to make certain that both of them were right where they were supposed to be.

Thinking of it now, Neal could never remember feeling so empty without Christa. It was true that she worked beside him every day, and they had conversations, but it was not the same intimacy that they had in the beginnings of their relationship. It had hurt when Grace had left him, with a broken heart and a useless ring, but somehow the gaping wound that had occurred when he and Christa _ceased_ to be hurt so much. It was a pain that couldn’t be described. There were some things that couldn’t.

All a broken person could express was the feeling they felt.

_“Mum, what does a home mean?”_

Neal had asked his mother that once. He must have been six years old. His dark brown hair was longer then, slightly curling at the ends as the six-year old boy stared at his mother with wide eyes at her answer. Dr. Asra Hudson had told her son that a home was where your family was. Her kind face slightly wavered at the small frown on her son’s face. Back then, Neal hadn’t been able to tear apart his mother with the words that were in his mind. She was his world. She was the only one he could connect with, as his father was demanding and always wanting more. It wasn’t easy being the son of two doctors. His classmates, although being in early childhood, seemed to note of how a small British-Indian boy was different from the rest of them. Perhaps they saw of how he always played by himself, and always worked hard – too hard – to please his father. Or perhaps a part of them could see of longing entered his eyes when their parents picked them up from primary school, and Neal had to walk home, alone.

Neal had asked his mother that question because he wondered if a demanding father and parents who often came home often after their child was asleep was considered home. _“Why am I alone? Why can't I see you as often as the other children and their parents?”_ he had wanted to ask. Of course, Neal understood his parents loved him. He would always try to stay awake until his parents came home, for his mother to kiss him good night and maybe his father to be proud of the achievements he had done that day. It wasn’t until Neal was older that he thought that the word _home_ meant something else. Home certainly wasn’t place where your father criticized your every accomplishment. Home wasn’t where you spent your time wishing you were following your own dreams instead of someone else’s.

It wasn’t just about family.

_Home was where people think about you and care about you._

Neal realized this shortly after completing his surgical residency. The field he had studied for years was not where he belonged. Not if it embodied everything he despised about surgery. Neal would never forget of how he told his mother that he was leaving. She understood him. Even though she wouldn’t say, Neal had a feeling that she understood the resentment and frustration he felt with his father. England, his home country, was considered home to him because of the fond memories he had of it – the rain that he loved watching on a cloudy day, watching the stars as his eight-year-old self waited to greet his parents with open arms, his childhood favorite food that he often ate after an argument with his father even as a teenager, his mother, and the happiness he had with his father that he couldn’t remember.

_Home was where people care about you._

Neal had considered Angels home for a long time long before he became friends with Mike, and individually loved Grace and Christa. Leanne, his mentor who had once intimidated him, and every single person he worked with, he felt connected to. The sound of melancholy, a piano playing a sad song, ceased as Neal began to see his colleagues as family. They didn’t have to accept him as one of their own; they could have, like his father, demanded that his skills were suited to surgery and that he didn’t belong in the ER. They could have, but they didn’t. Leanne and the others accepted him as he was. Neal could never express his gratitude to them. When he began to think of Angels as not a place to be intimidated of, but as a place of warmth and belonging, the somber song of self-induced solitude ceased.

And even when he changed and stopped running, they accepted him as well.

 _Home…_ Neal thought.

The meaning of home had changed. So much had changed since the day he had met Dr. Christa Lorenson, and after that. Neal turned around and slowly cupped his hands around Christa’s face. He could feel her surprise at the surgeon’s tenderness, a fond look across her eyes as she stared at him. Even with Grace, at the most blissful in their history, Neal hadn’t felt this way. To him, Christa was everything. She was more than just a second year resident at Angels Memorial Hospital, more than a woman who lost her son, and that had broken off their relationship and tore both of their hearts out in the process.

“I love you,” Neal whispered. He could see Christa’s eyes widen a fraction, as he had yet to say those words to her. A smile was in his eyes as began to stroke her face, memorizing every structure. “I love you,” he repeatedly softly, “because you are my home, Christa.”

“I love you too,” Christa stated softly. Tears were slowly running down her face. Neal didn’t try to wipe them away. The emotions that she felt was something that Neal loved about her, and admired her for it. Unlike Grace, who was strong and stubborn in her own right, never allowed him to see her cry. In some ways, she was like Leanne, who believed that admitting your innermost feelings of sadness was weakness. Despite of what Christa had been through, however, the blond woman he loved allowed herself to feel so much. “I once thought that I could never find anything as beautiful as I do now Neal.” A small smile framed her lips as Neal’s eyes gleamed, knowing she was feeling exactly the same. “When my son died and my ex-husband left, I thought I would never find happiness again. And…I gave it up. Because I foolishly believed that you didn’t care for much as the ghost of your past. I know different now, my love,” Christa whispered as a faint shadow framed Neal’s face. “I know that we hurt each other, and we won’t make that mistake again.”

“And why is that?” Neal asked. He was holding his breath. Christa’s face leaned towards his, so close he could count her long eyelashes that were framing her blue eyes that echoed every emotion within them.

Christa whispered into his ear. “Because…you are my home, and I am yours.”

She pulled away for a moment, both of them simply observing each other. It was as if each other them could understand what each other was feeling at the exact moment.

Their hands entwined, the touch tender and soft as Neal and Christa’s lips met for a loving kiss.  


End file.
